Amazon

Sixty percent of the Amazon Basin lies within Brazil. At least half of each country, Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador lie within Amazonia and about one fourth of Colombia and one fifth of Venezuela are contained within the basin. The world's greatest river, Amazon, flows 4,000 miles from its headwaters in the Peruvian Andes to the Atlantic Ocean. It pours more water into the sea than the next seven largest rivers on earth combined. Although it rivals the Nile in length, it carries at least 50 times the volume of water. It disgorges 20 percent of all fresh water entering the world's oceans and dumps one thousand million tons of sediment into the ocean every year. Seven of its tributaries are each over 1,000 miles long. One thousand miles from its mouth near Manaus, Brazil, the Amazon river is still nearly 7 miles wide! It is navigable by ocean-going barge as far as Iquitos, Peru, almost 3,000 miles from its mouth (approximately the distance from Boston to Denver).

Lured by tales of intrigue, exploration and grandeur, the Amazon Basin has beckoned new world adventurers since the Spaniard Francisco de Orellana first set foot on its banks in 1542. The territory commonly referred to as Amazonia is created by a network of more than 1,000 rivers, tributaries that feed into the mighty waterway after which the region was named. Covering an area of 2.3 million square miles, or approximately the size of the continental United States, Amazonia is home to the world's largest tropical forest and is considered by many to be the last great wilderness on earth holding a promise for the planet's future in its abundant wildlife and natural resources.

Home to at least one of every 10 species known on earth, the Amazon Basin is literally teeming with life. A four square mile tract of Amazonian forest typically contains 1,500 species of flowering plants, 125 species of mammals, 400 of birds, 100 of reptiles, 60 of amphibians, 150 of butterflies and tens of thousands of insects. One in five of the world's species of birds live in the Amazon Basin. Botanists have tens of thousands of plant species to catalog, many holding practical promise for anticancer drugs, contraceptives, insecticides and more. Doctors now use curare, the Indian arrow poison, as an antispasmodic, and without quinine and rubber - both natives of the Amazon rainforest - the histories of medicine, exploration and industry would be different. Sales of rainforest-derived medicines amounts to billions of dollars annually.

Contrary to earlier beliefs, the Amazon does not supply much of the world's oxygen (the oceans do), but deforestation does releases carbon dioxide which contributes to global warming. The region makes its own rain, recycling two-thirds of what falls either through transpiration from the leaves or by evaporation. Deforestation leads to a permanent change in this cycle.

Of the estimated 3 million inhabitants of the Amazon Basin at the begining of the 16th century, there may be as few as 100,000 Indians in about 130 tribes remaining today. Most have been driven far back into the remotest parts of the region. The main language groups are the Arawak, Je, Carib, Pano, Tupi and Xiriana (Yanomamo).There are several smaller groups whose dialects are derived from one of the main languages. These include the Tikuanas, Bora, Huitoto, Machiguenga, Yagua and others. Many Indians now live within large reserves like Xingu National Park in Brazil. Oposite to the declining numbers of natives, settlers are increasing rapidly in number due to government homesteading policies.